ACTIVIST ARRESTED IN SHOCKING MISCARRIAGE OF JUSTICE IN ZIMBABWE
Sometimes people get arrested or even convicted for crimes they did not commit. Being falsely accused and convicted of a crime one did not commit is a serious miscarriage of justice. It usually happens due to various factors, including wrongful identification of the accused, false testimony, contaminated evidence, prosecutorial misconduct, inadequate defense, circumstantial evidence, and confirmation bias, where investigators or prosecutors focus on a single suspect, ignoring other leads.
This is the case with prominent Zimbabwean human rights activist Namatai Kwekweza, who was seized from a Victoria Falls-bound domestic flight at Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport in Harare on August 1st. Kwekweza, a brave human rights activist who has faced police repression before and is the inaugural winner of the Kofi Annan NextGen Democracy Prize 2023, was arrested along with three other pro-democracy advocates: Robson Chere, Samuel Gwenzi, and Vusumuzi Moyo. They were accused of taking part in protests demanding the release of opposition leader Jameson Timba and 78 others, creating public disorder near the court.
Timba and others were arrested for holding a commemoration of Youth Day on June 16th at a house in Avondale, Harare. There has been a sweeping crackdown on civil society and opposition political activists ahead of the crucial Southern African Development Community summit in Harare on August 17th, in which President Emmerson Mnangagwa is heavily invested politically. Human rights activists say Chere was badly tortured and could have suffered kidney damage. Chere and others are being charged under a section of the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act.
The state claims that on June 27th, Kwekweza and others staged protests at the magistrate’s court in Harare, disrupting public peace through disorderly conduct. However, it has now been revealed that Kwekweza was not at the scene of the alleged crime on that day. Travel records show that she had left Harare for South Africa on June 23rd, 2024, on an Airlink flight and returned home on June 28th, 2024, on a Fastjet flight. This means she left before the incident and came back after. So she could not have been at two different places at the same time, especially in different countries.
This only happens in quantum superimposition or quantum mechanics, not to a human being. The consequences of Kwekweza’s wrongful arrest have been dire and devastating. These include loss of freedom, physical suffering, emotional trauma, financial burdens, damage to her reputation, and strained relationships. The presumption of innocence is a fundamental part of the rule of law and due process; one is presumed innocent until proven guilty. But in Zimbabwe, it is often the opposite: one is considered guilty until proven innocent, as recently happened in the high-profile Job Sikhala case, a brazen violation of the constitution and a dramatic miscarriage of justice.
Kwekweza’s case is a clear example of how justice can go wrong when the system fails to protect the innocent. The false accusation and wrongful arrest have caused her and her fellow activists immense suffering. It is a reminder that the legal system must always be vigilant to prevent such errors, as they can destroy lives and undermine public trust in the rule of law.
As the world watches, there is hope that the truth will come to light and justice will finally be served for Kwekweza and others like her who have been wrongly accused. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere, and this case is a stark reminder of the work that still needs to be done to ensure that the legal system truly serves the people it is meant to protect.
